Bring Out the Dead

Madison— Landowners could excavate and possibly develop some of the surviving Indian mounds of Wisconsin — many dating back more than a millennium — under legislation by two lawmakers.

The bill from Sen. Chris Kapenga (R-Delafield) and Rep. Robert Brooks (R-Saukville) would shift the balance of state law more toward private property rights and away from the preservation of one of the state’s unusual features.

The earthen burial mounds, shaped like bears, deer, panthers, birds and people, can stretch hundreds of feet in length or width and are one of the most enduring forms of art in the state. It’s been estimated that 80% were plowed under or otherwise destroyed to make way for farms and buildings, and those remaining sites that are cataloged are protected from disturbance by state law.

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Under the draft measure, the Wisconsin Historical Society would be required to give property owners a permit allowing them to investigate at their own expense whether their mounds contain burial remains, either through an archaeological dig or through ground-penetrating radar. If the mounds contained no remains, landowners could use their property however they wished.

There’s really nothing bad that has ever come from disturbing a graveyard. That never goes wrong for anyone.

At this point Wisconsin Republicans are not satisfied with harrying the living and have begun bothering the dead. It’s not enough to pick on university professors, union workers, minorities, women, and children who are going hungry. Now they’ve got to screw with THE DECEASED.

Once they’re done with the burial mounds, maybe they can start bulldozing some cemeteries. There are acres of useful land there, just being taken up by lazy dead people leeching off the taxpayers!